"Captivate" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... princely, grants have been made from the Leopold society, and other sources, chiefly, though by no means exclusively, in favour of this portion of the empire that is to be. These sums are expended in erecting showy churches and colleges, and in sustaining priests and emissaries. Everything is done to captivate, and to liberalise in appearance, a system essentially despotic. The sagacity of the effort is discovered, in avoiding to attack and shock the prejudices of the adult, that they may direct the education of the young. They look to the future; ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... laid down the external pomp of Protector, and, like Cincinnatus, has withdrawn to retirement, but not with the same view. This modesty is to captivate the crowd, who are to call on him to convert the ploughshare into an Imperial sceptre! I have excellent information to this effect, having found means to obtain it from behind the scenes ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 1 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald
... further efforts to captivate Perigal, and persuade him to fulfill the desire of her heart. Now, he was constantly about her on any and every excuse, when he would either kiss her or caress her hair. After dinner, they sat by the fire, where they drank coffee and smoked cigarettes. Presently, Perigal slipped on ...
— Sparrows - The Story of an Unprotected Girl • Horace W. C. Newte
... these weaknesses of method and execution, Lucan's style is unsuited to epic whether historical or legendary. He has not sufficient command of a definitely poetical vocabulary to enable him to captivate the reader by pure sensuous charm. He is, as Quintilian says, 'magis oratoribus quam poetis imitandus.' He cannot shake himself free from the influence of his rhetorical training. It is a severe condemnation of an ...
— Post-Augustan Poetry - From Seneca to Juvenal • H.E. Butler
... the first to be employed, and France would inevitably be the first object of a British expedition. The "march to Paris" had been proclaimed by orators, exhibited in theatres, and chanted in street ballads. All before us was conquest, and distinctions of every kind that can captivate the untried soldier, glittered in all eyes. I was young, ardent, and active. My name was one known to the table at which I seated myself on my introduction to the Guards, and I was immediately on the best footing with the gallant young men of a corps which has never suffered a ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 347, September, 1844 • Various
... imperishable element in his humour. And though the circle of his readers may have no tendency to increase, one can hardly suppose that a charm, which those who still feel it feel so keenly, will ever entirely cease to captivate; or that time can have any power over a perfume which so wonderfully retains the pungent freshness of its fragrance after the lapse of a ...
— Sterne • H.D. Traill
... with a playful mockery. "What! the great, the wonderful Knight of so many millions, failed, with all his glittering charms, to captivate the fair but simple Helen! Really, ...
— When A Man's A Man • Harold Bell Wright
... it that women of small endowments could captivate men at sight, and that others of inexhaustible potentialities—she was not afraid to rank herself among them—went unrecognized and undesired? If Rosie Fay had been content with the honors of a local belle, she could have had her choice among half the young men in the village. What was her gift? ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King
... a certain class of women, however, who as a rule are likely to become fretful and ill-tempered as they grow in years: girls who are allowed to grow up with uninformed judgments, who are taught that the chief end and aim of woman is to captivate and please the opposite sex, who are taught to think a pretty face and delicate figure of more importance than good sense or a thorough education. And yet it is a fact worthy of notice, that those who most eloquently assert their great superiority over ...
— Woman: Man's Equal • Thomas Webster
... character of secret societies in the sixteenth century. A more atrocious confederacy than this the human mind could hardly have conceived. It was, however, peculiarly calculated to captivate the multitude in those days of darkness and blood. Though at first formed and extended secretly, it spread like wildfire through all the cities and provinces of France. Princes, lords, gentlemen, artisans, and peasants rushed into its impious inclosures. The benighted populace, enthralled ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... is customary to take the shovel from the grate, and the key from the door, and to produce therewith a species of music which is supposed to captivate and soothe the winged tribe. If the bees do not settle on any neighbouring tree where they may have the full benefit of the inharmonious music, they are generally assailed with stones. This is a strange sort of proceeding, but it is ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 237, May 13, 1854 • Various
... evening she exerted herself, as usual, to captivate him, and bring him to her feet. She sang—she played—she liberally displayed the graces of her person, and the charms of her accomplished mind, but still in vain.—There he sat, with folded arms, in deep abstraction, gazing at the elaborate ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn
... I don't mind a bit o' aching, and I'm ready for any game you like. What do you say, sir, to trying to captivate the schooner again?" ...
— The Black Bar • George Manville Fenn
... that I am setting myself to captivate Mr. Boldwood, I suppose," she murmured. "At least they'll say so. Can't my hair be brushed down a little flatter? I dread going—yet I dread the risk of wounding him by ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... concerning the glorious things of the Lord Jesus Christ, or else thou wilt be exceedingly panting after them. For the Scriptures carry such a blessed beauty in them to that soul that hath faith in the things contained in them, that they do take the heart and captivate the soul of him that believeth them into the love and liking of them, believing all things that are written in the law and the prophets, and have hope towards God that there shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and unjust. 'And herein ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... the countenance, the gesture, and the voice. Here I might run into a pleasing enumeration of many instances of this; but, fearing that I have already trespassed upon your patience, shall desist. Permit me, however unusual, to close with a wish. May none of those unruly passions ever captivate any of my audience." ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... a very fair specimen of the pseudo-philosophy which is so admirably adapted to captivate the half-informed, wholly unformed minds of the undiscriminating multitudes who have been taught little or nothing well except to believe in their right, duty, and ability to judge for themselves in matters for which a life-time of specialization were barely sufficient. A congeries ...
— The Faith of the Millions (2nd series) • George Tyrrell
... nature impulsive, really adored her patroness. She governed her manners and she modelled her dress on that great original, and, next to Mrs. Ferrars, Sylvia in time became nearly the finest lady in London. There was, indeed, much in Mrs. Ferrars to captivate a person like Sylvia. Mrs. Ferrars was beautiful, fashionable, gorgeous, wonderfully expensive, and, where her taste was pleased, profusely generous. Her winning manner was not less irresistible because it was sometimes uncertain, and she had the ...
— Endymion • Benjamin Disraeli
... to those arts only which involve the exercise of the mind as a controlling factor. One may be a great orator, according to the usual acceptation of the term "great," and yet be only a declaimer and a rhetorician. That is to say, he may be able to captivate audiences by his superior action, as Demosthenes defines oratory to be, and at the same time his elocution and rhetoric may be unexceptionable, yet he maybe in fact totally lacking in every element which goes ...
— The Writings of Thomas Jefferson - Library Edition - Vol. 6 (of 20) • Thomas Jefferson
... but hers was a different style of beauty from that of Rose, whose ripe, sensuous charms were fitted to captivate the admiration of the voluptuary, while Sabine was of the most refined and ethereal character. Rose fettered the body with earthly trammels, while Sabine drew the soul heavenward. Her beauty was not of the kind that ...
— Caught In The Net • Emile Gaboriau
... condescended to this, and never sought to obtain ascendency over the people by pandering to their brutality, but by appealing to their reason; and the fanatical tone of his speeches possessed at least that decency that attends great ideas—he ruled by respect, and scorned to captivate them by familiarity. The more he gained the confidence of the lower classes, the more did he affect the philosophical tone and austere demeanour of the statesman. It was plainly perceptible in his most radical propositions, that ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine
... Juliet came to captivate London, another idol of the stage was led to the altar by William, first Earl of Craven. Louisa Brunton, for that was the name of Craven's Countess, was cradled, like her successor, on the stage; for her father was well known at every town on the Norwich Circuit as manager of a ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall
... love for Ernesto, Norina consents to play the part assigned to her and the charming simplicity of her manners, her modesty and loveliness so captivate the old man, that he falls into the trap and makes her an offer of his {61} hand. The marriage takes place, and one witness failing to appear, Ernesto, who happens to be near, and who is aware of the plot, is requested ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley
... women who desire to play the part of man, she made her appearance before Napoleon in the most absurd, tasteless attire. This woman of genius and folly lacked the wisdom of gauging the taste of Bonaparte, whom she desired to captivate with her sluttish appearance and ...
— The Tragedy of St. Helena • Walter Runciman
... would convey is, that the mother had rather endeavored to fill her child's mind with real information and knowledge, than to teach her that the chief end and aim of life were to learn how to captivate a husband; she preferred to make her daughter a true and noble-hearted woman, possessed of intrinsic excellence, rather than to make her marketable for matrimonial sale; to give her something that would prove to her under any and all circumstances, a reliance viz., sound principles ...
— The Sea-Witch - or, The African Quadroon A Story of the Slave Coast • Maturin Murray
... kind men like," sneered Bel, misanthropically. "You expect to captivate (and of course you will) this sincere and saintly young minister. He already thinks that you are by far the best of our party, and has some of the first symptoms that ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe
... distance before the others, boldly entered the house of a poor defenceless family, in which was only a Negro man, a woman and her children, terrified with the apprehensions of immediate death. The savage, perceiving their defenceless situation, without offering violence to the family attempted to captivate the Negro, who, happily proved an over-match for him, threw him on the ground, and, in the struggle, the mother of the children drew an ax from a corner of the cottage, and cut his head off, while her little daughter shut the door. ...
— The Adventures of Colonel Daniel Boone • John Filson
... to render Honoria Eversleigh an object of suspicion in the eyes of her husband. She had a double game to play; for she sought at once to gratify her ambition and her thirst for revenge. On one hand she wished to captivate Lord Sumner Howden; on the other she wanted to widen the gulf between ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... soon make me forget that I was transplanted; he could act dog, tame rabbit, fox, pony, and a whole nursery collection alive, but he was sometimes absent for days, and I was not of a temper to be on friendly terms with those who were unable to captivate my imagination as he had done. When he was at home I rode him all round the room and upstairs to bed, I lashed him with a whip till he frightened me, so real was his barking; if I said 'Menagerie' he became a caravan of wild beasts; I undid a button of ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... and for her sake, I hope that a due respect will be paid to the K., and while he and she were grudged every luxury in the world, by those mean wretches Burke, Gilbert,(238) and Lansdown, all kind of profusion is not thought of to captivate his R(oyal) H(ighness).(239) In short, I shall be glad, if his Majesty has lost his head, to hear that the P. has found it. I have given him as yet more credit than I would own, for I will not be accused of paying my court ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... glittering spear waved awful in her hand. There in the portal placed, the heaven-born maid Enormous riot and misrule survey'd. On hides of beeves, before the palace gate (Sad spoils of luxury), the suitors sate. With rival art, and ardour in their mien, At chess they vie, to captivate the queen; Divining of their loves. Attending nigh, A menial train the flowing bowl supply. Others, apart, the spacious hall prepare, And form the costly feast with busy care. There young Telemachus, his bloomy face Glowing celestial sweet, with godlike ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer, translated by Alexander Pope
... the slave be, as I have already observed to your majesty, there is no king on earth can tyrannize over her will. When indeed you speak of a slave mistress of charms sufficient to captivate a monarch, and induce him to love her; if she be of a rank infinitely below him, I am of your opinion, she ought to think herself happy in her misfortunes: still what happiness can it be, when she considers ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... tact. He did not badger the witnesses, or attempt to confuse them. His questions were plain and practical, and elicited answers that had a direct bearing upon the case. He did nothing for effect, and made no attempt to dazzle the jury or captivate the audience. When he arose to speak he was confronted by an audience that was too numerous for all to find seats in the court-room. He was attired in a fine broadcloth suit, silk hat, and polished boots. His neck was encircled by an old-fashioned silk choker. He perspired ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... measure your words well to shine in a Genevese society. This, however, is a very pardonable sort of coxcombry; and tho' it appear sometimes pedantic, and occasionally laughable, yet it tends to encourage learning and science, and compels the young men to read in order to shine and captivate ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye
... over her master, and that master the dispenser of life and death, honour and disgrace, to millions. I had made up my mind how to behave; the poets I had read had taught me but too well. Convinced that a little wilfulness would, from its novelty, be most likely to captivate one who had been accustomed to dull and passive obedience, I allowed my natural temper to be unchecked. The second day after my arrival, the Kislar Aga informed me that the sultan intended to honour me with a visit, and that the baths ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Captain Frederick Marryat
... give his mistress the features which captivate him; he is not then master of loving, or not loving the object of his tenderness; he is not master of his imagination or temperament. Whence it evidently follows, that man is not master of his volitions and desires. "But man," you will say, "can resist his desires; therefore he is free." ...
— Good Sense - 1772 • Paul Henri Thiry, Baron D'Holbach
... possession of so much beauty?" This beauty, indeed, was possessed by different lovers; a subject on which the modern hero had many refinements, and seemed to soar in the clouds. He adored at a respectful distance, and employed his valour to captivate the admiration, not to gain the possession of his mistress. A cold and unconquerable chastity was set up, as an idol to be worshipped, in the toils, the sufferings, and the combats of the hero ...
— An Essay on the History of Civil Society, Eighth Edition • Adam Ferguson, L.L.D.
... instructed with such care. She gave to her such graceful mien, That she, thereby, became a queen. For thus (may ever truth prevail) We draw our moral from this tale. This quality, fair ladies, know Prevails much more (you'll find it so) T'ingage and captivate a heart, Than a fine head dress'd up with art. The fairies' gift of greatest worth Is grace of bearing, not high birth; Without this gift we'll miss the prize; Possession ...
— The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault • Charles Perrault
... mine; for, to follow with ardour whatever was the impulse and fancy of the moment, was at once the charm and the danger of my aunt's character. She could not resist the temptation of initiating me, perhaps too early, into those studies which captivate the imagination and excite the feelings. German and Italian we studied together. The most romantic parts of history—all that was most interesting and bewitching in poetry, furnished materials for those hours which we devoted to reading. Reading! that most powerful instrument ...
— Ellen Middleton—A Tale • Georgiana Fullerton
... of universal Joy, Love chose to captivate again Zeokinizul, after such an Interval of boasted Liberty. The chief Inhabitants of Kofir, who are a distinct Body from the Nobility, the Magistracy, and the Citizens, had decorated in the most superb Manner the Sessions House for a Ball, to which they ...
— The Amours of Zeokinizul, King of the Kofirans - Translated from the Arabic of the famous Traveller Krinelbol • Claude Prosper Jolyot de Crbillon
... bought the paper, as he generally regretted every definite step which he took. The glow of romance which had sustained him during the preliminary negotiations had faded entirely. A girl has to be possessed of unusual charm to continue to captivate B, when she makes it plain daily that her heart is the exclusive property of A; and Roland had long since ceased to cherish any delusion that Bessie March was ever likely to feel anything but a mild liking for him. Young Mr. Petheram ...
— A Man of Means • P. G. Wodehouse and C. H. Bovill
... say, impregnable; for I protest t'ye, Sir Duncan, that I have known twenty-five men, by the mere surprise and audacity of the attack, win, at point of pike, as strong a hold as this of Ardenvohr, and put to the sword, captivate, or hold to the ransom, the defenders, being ten times ...
— A Legend of Montrose • Sir Walter Scott
... lurking in ambush, went afloat to wreak mischief, and the records of the First Church of Salem contain this quaint entry under date of July 25, 1677: "The Lord having given a Commission to the Indians to take no less than 13 of the Fishing Ketches of Salem and Captivate the men... it struck a great consternation into all the people here. The Pastor moved on the Lord's Day, and the whole people readily consented, to keep the Lecture Day following as a Fast Day, which was accordingly done.... The Lord was pleased ...
— The Old Merchant Marine - A Chronicle of American Ships and Sailors, Volume 36 in - the Chronicles Of America Series • Ralph D. Paine
... the great west, with cattle ranches as a setting, related in such a style as to captivate the hearts of ...
— The Saddle Boys in the Grand Canyon - or The Hermit of the Cave • James Carson
... better calculated than most men I know to charm and captivate them all. They will delight in your conversation and in you, and they will see to it that you have a perfect time and coin money—if only you lay yourself out to be uniformly nice to them, and watch carefully to see that you seem to be ...
— Recollections • David Christie Murray
... the people ... to secure, if not the allegiance, at least the passive, the generous acquiescence of the general mass of the population." To make his meaning perfectly clear, Mr. Pal instanced the rural reforms, the agricultural banks and other things which had been done in Lord Curzon's time, "to captivate the mind of the teeming masses," and he added that "he is a foolish politician in India who allows the Government to capture the mind of the masses to the exclusion of his own influence and his own countrymen." Mr. Pal is from his point of view perfectly logical, ...
— Indian Unrest • Valentine Chirol
... servant, and many indulgences of which they had not decided to deprive him. On the twenty-first of June, of the same year, he appeared before the Holy Office. Through its gloomy halls and passages he passed to the tribunal. There was little here, as in the other ecclesiastical buildings of Rome, to captivate the senses. The dark walls were unadorned with the creations of art; state and ceremony were the gloomy ushers to the chamber of intolerance. In silence and in mystery commenced the preparations. The familiars of the office advanced to the astronomer, and ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various
... "But I warn thee that there have been very many pleasanter companions than she will make thee, for she is excessively irritable and passionate. Withal she is so fond of admiration, that I have no doubt she would give chace to the ugliest toad that ever devoured a worm, so she could captivate him. She is ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 3 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones
... both capture and captivate him!" said Durkin, with a voice that was gruff only because it was indifferent. Still again he was oppressed by the feeling that she was ...
— Phantom Wires - A Novel • Arthur Stringer
... Miss Greeb to the altar, so that when her mother died the fair Julia almost despaired of attaining to the dignity of wifehood. Nevertheless, she continued to keep boarders, and to make attempts to captivate the hearts of such bachelors as she ...
— The Silent House • Fergus Hume
... candle. Mrs Bold, too, had been there, and had felt somewhat displeased with the taste, want of taste she called it, shown by Mr Arabin in paying so much attention to Madame Neroni. It was as infallible that Madeline should displease and irritate the women, as that she should charm and captivate the men. The one result followed naturally on the other. It was quite true that Mr Arabin had been charmed. He thought her a very clever and a very handsome woman; he thought also that her peculiar afflictions entitled her to the sympathy of all. He had never, ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... fascinates and enchains the imagination of men as power in another man. This man could captivate a woman by his sweetness or tame an angry mob of soldiers with a word; could mold the passions of a corrupt democracy or exterminate a nation in a day; could organize an empire or polish an epigram. ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... that lowering brow, Which indicates the mind within, I marvel much that woman's vow A man like that could ever win! Yet it is said, in rustic bower, (The fable I have often heard) A serpent has mysterious power To captivate ...
— Poems • George P. Morris
... and in art, Charmed and delighted his devoted heart, A gorgeous sunset, and a moonlit sky, Ne'er failed to captivate both mind ...
— Home Lyrics • Hannah. S. Battersby
... noticed, the other evening, was that the Tutor was sitting between the two Annexes, and the Counsellor was next to Number Five. Something ought to come of this arrangement. One of those two young ladies must certainly captivate and perhaps capture the Tutor. They are just the age to be falling in love and to be fallen in love with. The Tutor is good looking, intellectual, suspected of writing poetry, but a little shy, it appears to me. I am glad to see him between the two girls. If ...
— Over the Teacups • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... The passengers below had all retired to their beds; and I felt the interest of this quiet scene the more deeply from the circumstance of having just quitted them. For the Prussian had during the whole of the evening displayed all his talents to captivate the Dane, who had admitted him into the train of his dependents. The young Englishman continued to interpret the Prussian's jokes to me. They were all without exception profane and abominable, but some sufficiently witty, and a few incidents, which he related ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... here another crowd, artificers of all sorts, artists and artisans, professors of wisdom, (6) philosophers, and poets, with those who exhibit and popularise their works. (7) And next a new train of pleasure-seekers, eager to feast on everything sacred or secular, (8) which may captivate and charm eye and ear. Or once again, where are all those who seek to effect a rapid sale or purchase of a thousand commodities, to find what they want, if ...
— On Revenues • Xenophon
... piece of business!" exclaimed Berkley, when he had finished. "Strange enough! And yet I have long ceased to marvel at the caprices of women. Did not Pan captivate the chaste Diana? Did not Titania love Nick Bottom, with his ass's head? Do you think that maidens' eyes are no longer touched with the juice of love-in-idleness! Take my word for it, she is in love with somebody else. ...
— Hyperion • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... at her, rather obviously to captivate her by the sudden vision of his superb teeth—"La Bruna ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... him with civility, would converse with him, if opportunity favored, and treat him to a disquisition on the nature of government and the "beauty" of nullification, striving to make a lasting impression on his intellect. Clay would rise, extend his hand with that winning grace of his, and instantly captivate him by his all-conquering courtesy. He would call him by name, inquire respecting his health, the town whence he came, how long he had been in Washington, and send him away pleased with himself and enchanted with ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton
... ascensively, expatiates in those in-all-ways-sloping fields of metaphysical investigation which perplex whilst they captivate, and bewilder whilst they allure, cannot evitate the perception of perception's fallibility, nor avoid the conclusion (if that can be called a conclusion to which, it may be said, there are no premises extant) that the external senses are but ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... receive their greater, perhaps often only, pleasures from it. It is easy to imagine how the more evident and real beauties of the inferior schools, for we do not hesitate to speak of the Italian as the higher, more easily captivate, especially, the incipient lovers of art. They begin by collecting the Dutch; but as they advance in taste and knowledge, and acquire the legitimate feeling for art, they are sure to end with the Italian. The uninitiated may wonder to be told there is any difficulty in ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 360, October 1845 • Various
... rudimentary, their feelings are not refined enough to rouse that sentimental exaltation in us, which is the poetry of love. Nothing intellectual, no intoxication of thought or feeling is mingled with that sensual intoxication which those charming nonentities excite in us. Nevertheless, they captivate us like the others do, but in a different fashion, which is less tenacious, and, at the same time, less cruel ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume IV (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... of the first rudiments, but main principles, of a Christian, to captivate his understanding, and so regulate all his dictamens, that they be sure to run parallel with the sentiments of the Church. And this I take to be the case when the question is started about Purgatory fire, which I shall ever reckon in ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier
... deep, but clear. But this face"—as Lucrece came before her—"is deep enough. Not deep like a river, but like a snake. I could do well enough with your plain, honest sister; but I love you not, Mistress Lucrece. Enville. Your graceful ways do not captivate me. Ah! it takes a woman to know a woman. And the men, poor silly things! fancy they know us better than we ...
— Clare Avery - A Story of the Spanish Armada • Emily Sarah Holt
... what they understand not, and for Admiration to infer Love, and Love Praise, and Praise the use especially of such things as are set off with high and lofty expressions, it necessarily follows that such persons will cry up, and make use of, those that by these means captivate their understandings, especially their credits being ingaged also; but above all, if they proceed from meaner persons, of whom they are most credulous, having in suspition wiser men, believing the former are not able, and that the wiser ...
— A Short View of the Frauds and Abuses Committed by Apothecaries • Christopher Merrett
... visit "their libraries and any other repositories of books"; nay, there he finds heaped up amid the utmost poverty the utmost riches of wisdom. He freely employs the booksellers, but the wiles of the collector are as notorious as the wiles of women, and his chief aim is to "captivate the affection of all" who can get him books;—not even forgetting "the rectors of schools and the instructors of rude boys," although we cannot think he gets much from them. If he cannot buy books, he has copies ...
— Old English Libraries, The Making, Collection, and Use of Books • Ernest A. Savage
... principle of peace and good will in the breasts of the incautious Negroes, the Europeans have, by their bad example, led them into excess of drunkenness, debauchery, and avarice; whereby every passion of corrupt nature being inflamed, they have been easily prevailed upon to make war, and captivate one another; as well to furnish means for the excesses they had been habituated to, as to satisfy the greedy desire of gain in their profligate employers, who to this intent have furnished them with prodigious quantities of arms and ...
— Some Historical Account of Guinea, Its Situation, Produce, and the General Disposition of Its Inhabitants • Anthony Benezet
... speed, they don't offer to the mere lover of the beauties of nature, or improvement of human civilization, any great charm. Here nature is rich, but, farmerly or businessly speaking, killingly prosaic—no romance—no Lake Superior water—no scenery—nothing, finally, that could captivate a poetical glance. ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... neither Rachel nor I could have thought of anything so sure to captivate a shallow mortal ...
— The Love Affairs of an Old Maid • Lilian Bell
... neighbours and friends, were tried some years since in England for the murder of their husbands. It appeared that they were in love with the same individual, and had conjointly, at various times, paid sums of money to a Gipsy woman to work charms to captivate his affection. Whatever little effect the charm might produce, they were successful in their principal object, for the person in question carried on for some time a criminal intercourse with both. The matter came to the knowledge of the ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... the eyebrows, a modulation of the lips, an assertive or deprecatory wave of the hand, conveying so much—and a voice at that time of a singular penetrating sweetness, he was, even without that light of the future upon his forehead which she was so swift to discern, a man to captivate any woman of kindred nature and sympathies. Over and above these advantages, he possessed a rare quality of physical magnetism. By virtue of this he could either attract ...
— Life of Robert Browning • William Sharp
... greater power to charm the youthful reader than the conqueror of Peru. Not even King Arthur, or Thaddeus of Warsaw, has the power to captivate the imagination of the growing boy. Mr. Towle has handled his subject in a glowing but truthful manner; and we venture the assertion, that, were our children led to read such books as this, the taste ...
— All Adrift - or The Goldwing Club • Oliver Optic
... this Gospel to be received by the guilty, perishing creatures, for whose rescue from perdition it is designed. How should this display of divine compassion melt and captivate the hearts of those, whose sins have been thus expiated, and for whom an offer of free pardon and endless blessedness ...
— The National Preacher, Vol. 2 No. 7 Dec. 1827 • Aaron W. Leland and Elihu W. Baldwin
... the skin— Aye, Beauty's self was never worth a pin; But still it suits the superficial mind— The slight observer of the human kind; The airy, fleety, vain, and hollow thing, That only feeds on wily flattering. 'Man owns its powers?' And what will not man own To gain his end—to captivate—dethrone? The truth is this, whatever he may feign, You'll find your greatest loss his greatest gain; For like the bee, he will improve the hour, And all day long he'll hunt from flower to flower, And when he sips the ...
— The Communistic Societies of the United States • Charles Nordhoff
... spoke the truth, would prefer one of Titian's or Murillo's Virgins to one of Raffaelle's heavenly Madonnas. The less there is of marked expression or vivid color in a countenance or character, the more difficult to delineate it in such a manner as to captivate and interest us: but when this is done, and done to perfection, it is the miracle of poetry in painting, and of painting in poetry. Only Raffaelle and Correggio have achieved it in one case, and ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... ever heard in my life, preached by Dean Magee (afterwards Archbishop of York) on Christmas Day, 1866. His text was: "There were shepherds abiding in the fields." That marvellous orator must have had some peculiar gift of sympathy to captivate the attention of a child of ten so completely that he remembers portions of that sermon to this very day, fifty-four ...
— The Days Before Yesterday • Lord Frederick Hamilton
... until I was eighteen, and then one day I met a gentleman. Oh, my lad, it was no wonder I loved him; he was different from all the lads I had met in those parts, young, handsome, laughter-loving, just the man to captivate a lassie's heart. He married me, Scottish fashion, and on the day we were wed he told me he had received a letter which urged him to go back to his home at once. We were married secretly, my boy, ...
— The Day of Judgment • Joseph Hocking
... to have attained it by a different route. The innovation for which they claimed credit is a matter of method, of technique. Their deliberate purpose is to surprise us by the fidelity of their studies, to captivate and convince us by an accumulation of exact minutiae: in a word, to prove that truth is more interesting than fiction. So history should be written, and so they wrote it. First and last, whatever form they chose, they remained historians. Alleging the example set by Plutarch ...
— Rene Mauperin • Edmond de Goncourt and Jules de Goncourt
... he or she was in demand; a successful man had nearly every woman of prominence at his feet. The men planned their attacks upon the women whom they desired, and the women connived, posed, and set most ingenious traps and devised most extraordinary means to captivate their hero. As the century wore on and the vices and appetites gradually consumed the healthy tissues, there sprang up a class of monsters, most accomplished roues, consummate leaders of theoretical and practical immorality, who were without conscience. To gain ...
— Women of Modern France - Woman In All Ages And In All Countries • Hugo P. Thieme
... shines in all his mien, Which would so captivate, I ween, Wisdom's own goddess Pallas; That she'd discard her fav'rite owl, And take for pet a ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron
... conspicuous place in the store, office, or home of the person receiving them. Railway, insurance, and other corporations have vied with each other in the elegance and attractiveness of their charts, etc., until they have gone into the fine arts, and spared no expense to captivate the public. ...
— Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889 • Barkham Burroughs
... unknown. He would not relinquish her. She should be a daughter to him. He realized that he had a curious love for the child, that she had attracted him from the first. In the years to come her beauty and winsomeness would captivate a husband, with the dowry he ...
— A Little Girl in Old Quebec • Amanda Millie Douglas
... though not changed to owl or bat, Or something more indelicate; Yet, as your tongue has run too fast, Your boasted beauty must not last. No more shall frolic Cupid lie In ambuscade in either eye, From thence to aim his keenest dart To captivate each youthful heart: No more shall envious misses pine At charms now flown, that once were thine: No more, since you so ill behave, Shall injured ...
— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various
... happily executed before; the pure spirituality of the conception, the elegance and force of the language, the harmony and variety of the numbers, were all executed with a felicity which none before or since have reached. That these poems did not at once captivate the public attention cannot be accounted for by any cause hitherto assigned. We may not wonder that the multitude did not at once perceive their full beauties; but that, among readers of taste and learning, there should not have been found a sufficient number to set the example of admiration, is ...
— The Poetical Works of William Collins - With a Memoir • William Collins
... slim young fellow, with an olive, Velasquez-like face, and dark, tender eyes. I have seldom seen a man who was more likely to excite a woman's interest, or to captivate her imagination. His expression was, as a rule, dreamy, and even languid; but if in conversation a subject arose which interested him he would be all animation in a moment. On such occasions his colour would heighten, his eyes gleam, and he could speak with an eloquence which would ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... your majesty entreat With clemency to beautify your seat Toward this prince, distress'd by his desires, Too many, all too strong to captivate. ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various
... did not love you, Jude; that I own. When I first knew you I merely wanted you to love me. I did not exactly flirt with you; but that inborn craving which undermines some women's morals almost more than unbridled passion—the craving to attract and captivate, regardless of the injury it may do the man—was in me; and when I found I had caught you, I was frightened. And then—I don't know how it was—I couldn't bear to let you go—possibly to Arabella again—and so I got to ...
— Jude the Obscure • Thomas Hardy
... playwrights, Daudet was influenced rather by the virile dramas of Dumas fils and Augier. But in "Fromont and Risler," not only is the plot a trifle stagy, but the heroine herself seems almost a refugee of the footlights; exquisitely presented as Sidonie is, she fails quite to captivate or convince, perhaps because her sisters have been seen so often before in this play and in that. And now and again even in his later novels we discover that Daudet has needlessly achieved the adroit arrangement ...
— The Nabob, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... Editor who read these lines Has quite a different tale; He says it is the she that shines To captivate the male. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, October 13, 1920 • Various
... was the aim and object of her life. If I told her that in such a house, in such a street, there lived a man who was not attracted by her, it would have caused her real suffering. She wanted every day to enchant, to captivate, to drive men crazy. The fact that I was in her power and reduced to a complete nonentity before her charms gave her the same sort of satisfaction that victors used to get in tournaments.... She had an extraordinary opinion of her own charms; she imagined ...
— Old and New Masters • Robert Lynd
... lovers triumph, and the fair one's shame. There to the laughing god in flow'rs array'd, The graceful throng their daily homage paid; There in his temple learn'd the fatal art, 30 To please, seduce, and captivate the heart. Young Hope, in flatt'ring smiles for ever gay, To Love's mysterious altar leads the way: The graces round, half veil'd and half in sight, Enticing motion with their voice unite; 35 While Indolence, luxurious laid along, Listless and ...
— The Fourth Book of Virgil's Aeneid and the Ninth Book of Voltaire's Henriad • Virgil and Voltaire
... which made it human. The laughing maidens with their bright eyes and cheering accents, gave vivacity to its milder charms. We have heard from the lips of the younger traveller, that these attractions had failed to captivate his fancy. We may believe of this as we please. It is very probable that he had, in considerable part, spoken nothing but the truth. He was too much of a mocker;—one of those worldlings who derive their pleasures from circumstances ...
— Charlemont • W. Gilmore Simms
... these things], you have said truly that where pleasure of the body is greater and fuller, there is the exile of the soul; and where luxury reigns there the soul is a wretched and afflicted hand-maid. O Paris! How well-suited art thou to captivate and deceive souls! In thee are the nets of the vices, in thee the arrow of Hell transfixes the hearts of the foolish! This my John has felt and therefore he has named it an exile. Would that you were leaving behind that exile of yours just as it is, and were hastening ...
— Readings in the History of Education - Mediaeval Universities • Arthur O. Norton
... both in confirming and enlarging his empire" (p. 117); and many of the barbarous tribes were "converted to the faith" by means of pretended miracles, "pious frauds ... very commonly practised in Gaul and in Spain at this time, in order to captivate, with more facility, the minds of a rude and barbarous people, who were scarcely susceptible of a rational conviction" (pp. 117, 118). The supremacy of the see of Rome advanced with rapid strides during this century. The ...
— The Freethinker's Text Book, Part II. - Christianity: Its Evidences, Its Origin, Its Morality, Its History • Annie Besant
... one set of Geisha girls who were masked below the eyes, one of whom sang what she fondly imagined was a typical American song calculated to captivate her American audience. She sang through her nose, the better to imitate the nasal voices which to the British mind is the national characteristic of the American, and her song had the refrain beginning "For I am an Ammurikin ...
— Abroad with the Jimmies • Lilian Bell
... their foot-wear was apt to be either moccasins, or such boots as they themselves could make from the hides which they themselves had cured. In Lincoln's boyhood the hunting-shirt and leggings made of skins were a sufficiently respectable garb; and buckskin breeches dyed green were enough to captivate the heart of any girl who wished a fashionable lover; but by the time that he had become a young man, most self-respecting men had suits of jeans. The ugly butcher's knife and tomahawk, which had been essential ...
— Abraham Lincoln, Vol. I. • John T. Morse
... Christian man—an orthodox Churchman (if you require that shibboleth). Was I so very wrong? What was there in the idea of religion which was represented to me at home to captivate me? What was the use of a child's hearing of "God's great love manifested in the scheme of redemption," when he heard, in the same breath, that the effects of that redemption were practically confined only to one human being out of a thousand, and that the other nine hundred and ninety-nine ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al
... attempted to prove that the accession of his majesty to the Germanic confederation, as Elector of Hanover, would give mortal offence to the Emperor Joseph, and would indispose him to an alliance with Great Britain in the event of a future war. He argued, that it was our interest to conciliate and captivate Austria, as the only power in Europe able to keep France in awe. Fox next adverted to a favourable opportunity for an alliance with Russia, which had been lost, and then condemned a commercial treaty, which government had begun to negociate with France. The experience of ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... monks, who had travelled on our globe from a desire to convert the gentiles. We therefore told them that they did well to shun them, because their intention was, not to teach, but to secure gain and dominion; and that they strive by various means first to captivate men's minds (animi), and afterwards to subject them to themselves as slaves: moreover, that they did well in not suffering their idea concerning God to be disturbed by such spirits. They said further, ...
— Earths In Our Solar System Which Are Called Planets, and Earths In The Starry Heaven Their Inhabitants, And The Spirits And Angels There • Emanuel Swedenborg
... train, and asks me to send to meet her. Oh, dear, this is lovely. I have not seen my dear Mrs. Willis for over a year. What a rest and comfort it will be to talk to her again. Molly, you will delight in her; she is just the woman to captivate you completely. Nora, you will lose your heart to her, too. I don't know what wonderful thing there is about her; she is so strong, so noble, so gentle, that she wins all hearts; it is impossible for anybody to be naughty when Mrs. Willis is in the house. ...
— Red Rose and Tiger Lily - or, In a Wider World • L. T. Meade
... was mistaken. Catherine, it would seem, had no mind so far to indulge him; for, moved either by delicacy or caprice, or some of those indescribable shades betwixt the one and the other, with which women love to tease, and at the same time to captivate, the ruder sex, she reminded the Abbess that it was necessary she should retire an hour before vespers; and, receiving the ready and approving nod of her Superior, she arose to withdraw. But before leaving the apartment, she made obeisance ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... I suppose to be the opinion, according to what I have heard, of the greater number of young and pretty women, who use their eyes as a weapon of offense, or as a sort of electric battery, by means of which to subdue hearts and captivate them. Not like those, indeed, are Pepita's eyes, wherein dwell a peace and a serenity as of heaven. And yet it can not be said that there is anything of coldness in their glance. Her eyes are full of charity and sweetness. They rest with tenderness on a ray of ...
— Pepita Ximenez • Juan Valera
... as the proper man to become his future son-in-law. And Miss Mary, who lost her passion for Dick Giblet, after he shut the watch-dog in the kitchen-pantry,—a trick which had nearly cost her the loss of a beloved mother,—and finding she could not captivate the handsome Colonel Malcome with checkered aprons and broad lace, began, like a dutiful child, to receive the advances of the mild Theophilus more graciously, and had, after much maidenly confusion, consented to become his wife, when, as we have seen, ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... Hera adorns herself to captivate Jove, her zone is fringed with a hundred tassels, and her ear-rings are described in terms corresponding exactly to the triple ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... will find that Mr. Heady (Uncle Juvinell) has produced a very entertaining and instructive volume. It is written in a racy, sprightly style, that cannot fail to captivate the mind. Partaking himself of the buoyancy and good humor of boyhood, the author is able to write for the boys in a manner that is at once attractive and profitable. He has written a live book of one, who, "though dead, yet speaketh." It is replete with facts, and lessons of wisdom. ...
— The Farmer Boy, and How He Became Commander-In-Chief • Morrison Heady
... of the place and the security from wild beasts were all calculated to captivate their fancy and render them contented, the poor Sakais drooped and pined for the vicissitudes of their wild life in the woods where comfort was unknown and food was sometimes scarce. Their thoughts, their very souls were always back ...
— My Friends the Savages - Notes and Observations of a Perak settler (Malay Peninsula) • Giovanni Battista Cerruti
... cruelty the powers of Erebus, he sang his complaints to the rocks and mountains, melting the hearts of tigers and moving the oaks from their stations. He held himself aloof from womankind, dwelling constantly on the recollection of his sad mischance. The Thracian maidens tried their best to captivate him, but he repulsed their advances. They bore with him as long as they could; but finding him insensible, one day, one of them, excited by the rites of Bacchus, exclaimed, "See yonder our despiser!" and threw at him her javelin. The weapon, as soon as ...
— TITLE • AUTHOR
... there was not a distinct flavor of iniquity. More ability and less morality was the opinion generally entertained, though probably not often expressed. Hence it was not unnatural that the sentimental dandies and high-toned villains of Bulwer's earlier novels should have been the heroes to captivate all hearts. ...
— James Fenimore Cooper - American Men of Letters • Thomas R. Lounsbury
... monotonous life of asceticism and poverty is so essentially opposed to the spirit that creates the energy and enthusiasm of industry, that their continued coexistence may be regarded as impossible." But such a fatal mistake could not long captivate the mind, or cause men to forget Benedict and his industrial ideal. The blessings of wealth rightly administered, and the dignity of labor without which wealth is impossible, came to be recognized as necessary factors in the true progress ...
— A Short History of Monks and Monasteries • Alfred Wesley Wishart
... principles, notions, opinions, decrees, traditions, and doctrines that they taught distinct from the true and holy doctrines of the prophets. And they made to themselves disciples by such doctrine, men that they could captivate by those principles, laws, doctrines, and traditions: and therefore such are said to be of the sect of the Pharisees: that is, the scholars and disciples of them, converted to them and to their doctrine. O! it is easy for souls to appropriate conversion to themselves, ...
— The Pharisee And The Publican • John Bunyan
... vision and revelation, with a complete scheme of reconciliation, with correlated catalogues of Shint[o] and Buddhist gods, with liturgies, with lists of old popular festivals newly named, with the apparatus of art to captivate the senses, K[o]b[o] forthwith baptized each native Shint[o] deity with a new Chinese-Buddhistic name. For every Shint[o] festival he arranged a corresponding Buddhist's saints' day or gala time. ...
— The Religions of Japan - From the Dawn of History to the Era of Meiji • William Elliot Griffis
... description of the young Empress's character is an interesting one, and also agrees with what I had heard from those who know her well. It may be in her power to do much good—and I hope she may. Her character is made to captivate a man, I should say—particularly ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria
... that, as a last chance, the most beautiful virgin in the city should be sent as a peace-offering to the desert chief. Kaotsou accepted the plan,—nothing else presenting itself,—and the maiden was chosen and sent. She went willingly, it is said, and used her utmost arts to captivate the Tartar chief. She succeeded, and Mehe, after forcing Kaotsou to sign an ignominious treaty, suffered his prize to escape, and retired to the desert, well satisfied with the rich spoils he had won. Kaotsou ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 12 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... carriage, or in the larger carriage with Clifton and Mr Maxwell, or her father, she saw, and professed herself delighted with it. She admired the farm-houses and the farmers, and the farmers' wives and daughters, and laid herself out to captivate them in a way that Clifton declared to be wonderful. To Elizabeth ...
— David Fleming's Forgiveness • Margaret Murray Robertson
... of advance, your plans. Suppose, for instance, I captivate his Grace. As extraordinary things have happened, as you know. High place must be respected, and the coronet of a Duchess must not ...
— The Young Duke • Benjamin Disraeli
... Ben Hardin, John J. Crittenden and John C. Breckenridge in Kentucky. Tradition still has stories to tell of their exploits and prowess, their wit and eloquence, even their commonplace sayings and doings. They were marked men who never failed to captivate their audiences. The system of stump oratory had many advantages as a public force and was both edifying and educational. There were a few conspicuous writers for the press, such as Ritchie, Greeley and Prentice. But the day of personal journalism and newspaper influence ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson
... time Olivier did not call her back; it was as if the contact of her arm and the satisfaction of knowing that he had given her pleasure had quieted him; but he followed all her movements with the pleasure one feels in seeing the persons or things that captivate and intoxicate our eyes. When she returned, with a large cluster of flowers, he drew a deep breath, seeking unconsciously to inhale something of her, a little of her breath or the warmth of her skin in the air stirred by her ...
— Strong as Death • Guy de Maupassant
... beautiful, has wealth in plenteous store, And fortune fine in calves and kine, and lovers half a score; Her faintest smile would saints beguile, or sinners captivate, Oh! I think a dale of Moya, but ...
— Penelope's Irish Experiences • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... and nowhere worse? Tell me, Fiesco, how long will this endless passion endure? But, alas! I've risked too much already now to hesitate at staking my last. I trusted boldly to my charms to captivate thee—to preserve thy love, I fear they'll prove too weak. Fie upon me!—what am I uttering? (Hides her face with ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller |
